I live in an Apartment complex and I am having trouble removing my attention when the puppy becomes over excited. If I leave the room or kennel him he escalates his barking, disturbing all of my neighbors. When I am sitting on the couch, he will stand near me and bark shrillly looking for my attention and I am not sure what kind of solution to come upon to prevent his over excitement without disturbing everyone in my building. Thank you guys!
What sort of things are you doing with him? What kind of socialising and training activities is he getting? A key thing will be training him to settle (on a mat or dog bed or on the couch) instead of barking at you. But another important preventative will be giving him enough to do so he’s content at other times and is not needing to demand attention from you. This article might help a bit: https://www.thelabradorsite.com/attention-seeking-dog/
Hopefully he has not been in his crate all day long while you are gone. If so you need to figure out how to get him out for some play and "exercise" during the day. They have much shorter sleep/awake cycles than people do and when they are pups they have not adjusted to our schedules. Mine has about a 2 hour sleep cycle at age 3, he will relax around the house for a few hours, snoozing and keeping an eye on things. But then he needs something to do for a while. He is on our schedule when it comes to night time. If I recall correctly it was much shorter when he was a pup. Sleep an hour maybe two, then be awake for a short period wanting to do something. Oh, now this is just my opinion and a few others might take me to task but. . . .if he is barking at you that means he needs to do something, he has energy and wants to expend it. Dogs that have had enough exercise generally do not just bark at their owners for the heck of it. There is a strange concept that one can have a dog, take it for a walk once a day, let it out for pee breaks and all will be well. I can definitely confirm that will not work for a labrador. These are really smart dogs, they want exercise and they like having their brains challenged.
A couple of ideas for indoor activities: Put a few pieces of kibble in an empty plastic bottle without a lid. Your puppy can chase it and knock it around to get the kibble out. Get some large cardboard boxes for your puppy to play with -big enough for him to climb in (of course he’ll chew them as well.) Play tug or fetch for a few minutes. Many puppies seem to have a manic time in the evening but a short play time can help them settle down.
Definitely not, we have not left him alone in the first 7 days since picking him up. We are still yet to begin separation training in fear of him having a loud meltdown. Will kennel training at night prepare him for being left for a few hours in the day? We tried this, but we were concerned with him eating the cardboard. Is that reason for concern?
Eating cardboard and other stuff...... There is nothing inherently dangerous in eating cardboard, though it is possible it could cause a blockage in his system. That would not be good. That said, we have found that Murph will swallow things if we turn it into a game of keepaway. If we do not pursue him most things that are not tasty get dropped. He always tore cardboard to smithereens when he was a pup, we let him and noticed it was not being eaten, just shredded. He grew out of the cardboard fascination as he grew older. One of the things that will really help everyone is if we knew the age of your dog. I cannot stress enough how important exercise is for these guys. It does not need to be long walks (which are not good for a young puppy) or physically demanding. Just being awake and active is good for them. When Murph was little he liked to lay down and play with me. I would move a toy, he would take it back, I would shake it a bit, he would pull back a bit. He was doing "something". He would get tired and fall asleep. Having a young dog is like having a young child. Your "downtime" is no longer on your schedule, it is on their schedule. It is 8 PM, they want to play a bit, I recommend you play a bit. As they grow older you can adjust it a bit. Mr. Murphy is done for the day about 8 PM or so. He goes out to play around 6 PM or so for about 20 minutes, then about 7:30 we have a game of "blue blanket" for 10 or 15 minutes. After that he is not interested in going out or playing anymore. The next time he wants to do something is about 7 AM. But he is three years old now, he was not like that when he was a puppy. It takes time.
I mentioned above that he is 7 weeks old. Thank you for the cardboard advice! 7 weeks old. We adopted him at 6 weeks old.
At 7 weeks you have an infant. Think of him that way. At that age if he wants to go in another room with you, let him. Hopefully someone who specializes in training will come along soon and give you some advice about how much and what kind of training you should be doing at this age. I am not into a lot of training stuff so I am not the guy for it. All we concentrated on when Murph was 8 wks old was getting him to go outside and making sure he did not eat bad stuff. When I was home (which was most of the time) I kept him with me no matter where I went. Yea, it can be a pain, with a little puppy tagging along anything I did took at least 2 to 3 times longer. But, I signed up for it! One thing to keep in mind (and you may have noticed this already) is they watch you, all the time. They learn your habits and patterns and then adjust accordingly. For instance, Murph would follow me to the bathroom. Once he figured out that when I headed that way I was going to the bathroom, he stopped following me. I guess it is because he learned that I went there, and then I came back. I personally think that preventing them from learning your habits can cause a bit of insecurity on their part. Or, to put it simply, they are nosey as all get out! (pun intended)
